As David Carnoy recently posted, voice over Internet Protocol company Ooma is now offering a $49.99 Wi-Fi adapter that enables users to place the required Telo base station anywhere within Wi-Fi range.

Ooma CEO Eric Stang
Ooma

I had a chance to test the system in my house, and it works fine, even though it's a few rooms away from my wireless router. Installation requires temporarily connecting the Telo to an Ethernet port of a computer to configure your Wi-Fi settings.

Listen to a call
To learn more and to demonstrate the voice quality of Ooma service, I called Ooma CEO Eric Stang using my Ooma line, which is connected to an audio mixer that is, in turn, connected to my PC so I could record the call. In this audio recording, my voice is not going through the phone line--I'm speaking directly into a microphone--but Stang's is.

Stang said the call quality would have been better, had I been on an Ooma cordless handset, which offers some extra audio enhancements but, as you'll hear, it still sounds pretty good. As with any VoIP service, the actual quality of the call depends, in part, on the quality of your Internet connection.

Listen now

About the author

Larry Magid is a technology journalist and an Internet safety advocate. He's been writing and speaking about Internet safety since he wrote Internet safety guide "Child Safety on the Information Highway" in 1994. He is co-director of ConnectSafely.org, founder of SafeKids.com and SafeTeens.com, and a board member of the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children. Larry's technology analysis and commentary can be heard on CBS News and CBS affiliates, and read on CBSNews.com. He also writes a personal-tech column for the San Jose Mercury News. You can e-mail Larry.
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